Inhalt

Background

It is said to have happened exactly 70 years ago: On 4 September 1949, Herta Heuwer’s snack stand on the corner of Kantstrasse/Kaiser-Friedrich-Strasse in the Charlottenburg district of Berlin was not very busy. So she experimented with different ingredients like tomato paste, curry powder and Worcestershire sauce.

We used to know the “Grüner Punkt” (Green Dot), but now there is also the “Grüner Knopf” (Green Button). This is made possible by the Trade Mark Law Modernisation Act, which came into force at the beginning of the year, on 14 January. It created a new trade mark category, the “certification mark”. The “Grüner Knopf” is the first certification mark that was registered by the DPMA.

On 8 September, the German Patent and Trade Mark Office - IDZ Berlin will participate in the Germany-wide Open Monument Day. The office building at the capital's location can look back on a long and varied history, although the definition of the term "long", especially in connection with buildings, is of course relative.

August 2nd is International Beer Day. One could take this as an occasion to drown a couple of pints (the initiators do not have much more in mind either) - or to take a serious look at the property rights around an ancient cultural asset that is constantly being further developed.

According to the Global Innovation Index 2019 (GII 2019) presented in New Delhi on 24 July, Switzerland is the most innovative country in the world. This is followed by Sweden, the United States of America (USA), the Netherlands and Great Britain. As in the previous year, Germany is in ninth place and thus holds its own in the top group of the 129 countries surveyed.

Not only in this hot early summer 2019 we started to sweat a lot. For example, sporting activities are also sweaty matters with which a little desired body odour can be associated. Deodorants, or "antiperspirants and deodorants", have become an integral part of the repertoire of our personal care products. Perhaps less known: Even though the odour problems associated with sweating have been known for thousands of years, deodorant is still being developed and patented.

His groundbreaking inventions help predict and better diagnose serious diseases: The President of the German Patent and Trade Mark Office, Cornelia Rudloff-Schäffer, was very pleased about physicist and biochemist Matthias Mann being nominated for the European Inventor Award.

On 9 May 1950, the then French foreign minister Robert Schuman presented his plan to consolidate the coal and steel production of the former war opponents, thus marking a decisive turning point in European history. For us, Europe Day is an occasion to focus on a Europe-wide IP right, the "protected indications of geographical origin".

Fans around the world celebrate Star Wars Day on May 4. Why on this date? Well, the pronunciation of the date "May the 4th" is very similar to the beginning of what is probably the most popular sentence in the space saga, "May the force be with you".

According to studies, citizens with foreign roots often set up companies and increasingly contribute to technical innovation. In Munich, the DPMA now hosted an information day - and met guests with ambitious plans.

This year's "Plagiarius" awards were presented at the "Ambiente" consumer-goods fair in Frankfurt on 8 February. Aktion Plagiarius e.V. has been awarding the dreaded Plagiarius Prize to manufacturers and retailers of particularly brazen plagiarisms and counterfeits for the 43rd time since 1977.

January 4th is World Braille Day. The World Blind Union has initiated this annual commemoration day to once again emphasize the importance of Braille for visually handicapped people. The day commemorates the birthday of Louis Braille, who was born in 1809 in the French village of Coupvray near Paris.

This year's DesignEuropa Awards were presented in Warsaw on 27 November 2018: On the occasion of the ceremony, the Vice-President of the DPMA, Christine Moosbauer, congratulated Hartmut Esslinger, one of the winners. The German-American industrial designer received the award for his life's work.

Autonomous driving is one of the most important technological trends of recent years. The number of national patent applications (and PCT applications in the national phase) relating to autonomous driving has increased steadily since 2010 and has more than doubled since then.58 percent of patent applications for autonomous driving come from Germany.

The European Commission contracted the Max Planck Institute for Intellectual Property, Competition and Tax Law (now the ) to carry out a study reviewing the harmonisation process of trade mark law in the European Union. Based on this study, the member states, the Commission, the European Council and the European Parliament prepared a new version of the Trade Marks Directive as well as of the Regulation on the Community trade mark (now called "European Union Trade Mark Regulation").

"United in diversity" the motto of the European Union expresses how Europeans strive together for peace and prosperity, while at the same time the entire continent is being enriched by its many different cultures, traditions and languages. These include the excellent regional specialties among agricultural products and foodstuffs. Who does not know Nürnberger Lebkuchen (gingerbread), Spreewälder Gurken (cucumber), Französischer Champagner (champagne) or Prosciutto di Parma (ham)?

Imagine you are driving in your car through a city on a busy road and every few yards, unexpectedly, a dustbin comes rolling onto your lane of traffic. You have to evade each dustbin immediately and avoid jeopardising another road user. Does this sound unrealistic to you? Well, this is just about what is happening in space nowadays.

The German Patent and Trade Mark Office (DPMA) regularly receives complaints about such letters via customer service. The DPMA positively points out that all these letters are not related to the Office. The Office does not send invoices or requests for payment at any time - neither for the application or renewal of industrial property rights nor for the publication of industrial property rights in the official registers.